O HOLY CHURCH OF ENGLAND! Brightest and fairest province of the realm of heaven on earth! What shining paths of truth and holiness are Thine!—And they are thronged by all Thy many Saints, farther than eye can trace through long past ages! What rivers of full grace flow through Thy mighty channels! What living fountains send forth their waters, refreshing evermore the weary and parched soul! Within Thy hallowed walls Thy saintly children trod in the ancient days—(the “old times of which our Fathers have told us”),—they whose monuments of goodness and glory are around us—in whose prayers we pray to the ETERNAL FATHER of all—in whose Psalms “we praise THEE O GOD, _we_ acknowledge THEE to be THE LORD,” from age to age.—O HOLY CHURCH of the many wise and good! O CHURCH of patient Martyrs and godly Confessors!—with whom we hold such mystical Communion, such “fellowship one with another,” that the “blood of CHRIST here cleanseth us!”—To GOD be glory in Thee, O CHURCH of our Land! throughout all ages, world without end! Amen. NOTES. No. I. IT seems alike congruous to human nature, and consistent with every Divine dispensation to say, that man is more effectually influenced by the personal instrumentality of his fellow man, than by any other means. Statesmen and politicians seem to have seen this; and in every age have acted upon it; and have thought it necessary to give their sanction and support to a priesthood, even for the attainment of worldly ends. The lower classes of the community also, bear unequivocal testimony to the same truth—the suitability of the living Priesthood as the effective means of influencing human nature. Even among those classes of our own people, who affect to make light of the authority of the Ministry, it is remarkable how much that authority is _felt_ after all; and how much even the systematic rejecters of the established Priesthood, are accustomed to impute high power and efficacy to the ministrations, and often to the very persons, of their own self-sent ministers. Books have their use—but Man directly influences man, in a more vital way. And more than this. Some men _naturally_ influence their fellows more than others: and some men _Divinely_; that is by Divine appointment. It is true, for instance, that by the very necessity of our social nature and condition, we affect one another in a very important degree; and that it is even a duty sometimes to exert our moral influence on our brethren. And the degree in which we are able to accomplish this, will be variously determined. But beyond the natural influence which we thus exercise, there is an instituted influence, as much a matter of _fact_ as the former. Keeping to the religious view of this question only, I would thus further explain: